Biology Reference
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the roofs of the nearby buildings. There seemed to be little concern as
to where or on whom it might land. The whole scene was wonderful.
With Carnival finally over, the next morning we made our bleary-
eyed way to the ferry terminal and waited patiently in line with all the
big trucks carrying supplies across the Gulf to La Paz and Baja Cali-
fornia Sur. You learn to be patient in Mexico. Scheduled events sel-
dom take place on time—a fact that will drive you crazy if you hang
on to the American expectation that things happen when they're sup-
posed to happen.
Our turn eventually came and we drove on board and down into
the bowels of the big ship. The ship was crowded: people—families,
truck drivers, businessmen, a few tourists, and the three of us—were
sleeping anywhere on the upper deck they could find a place to lie down.
Before the paved two-lane Baja highway was completed in 1972, the
ferry was the only practical way to reach Baja California Sur.
Arriving in La Paz, we shopped for groceries and, of course, more
cases of cerveza, then headed south to the Cape. Kym, still feeling aw-
ful, lay on the nets in the back of the truck and added external sun-
burn to his internal troubles. We stopped briefly at El Triunfo, a pic-
turesque abandoned silver-mining town, and after that took a refreshing
cold-beer break at the bar of the first sportfishing resort in Baja, Buena
Vista, where the wealthy fly in to catch marlin. Then onward to the lit-
tle house of a resident American diver, Don Scott, and his charming
Mexican wife, Julia, where we had arranged to stay while at the Cape.
We quickly discovered that land-based collecting is a lot more work
than collecting from a boat. The first job was to put the fish receivers
together on land, drag them to the water, and then scrounge suitably
large, heavy objects to use as anchors.
We had the use of an old thirteen-foot Boston Whaler, formerly a
dolphin chase boat for a yellowfin tuna purse seiner, that was tied to
a mooring a hundred feet or so o¤ the beach near the tuna cannery.
To keep the front end down at high speed in choppy water, the bow
had been filled with concrete. It was a beat-up old scow, but it still
floated—testimony to the abuse the rugged Boston Whaler can take.
We'd been used to having our dive boat tied alongside our mother
ship, gassed up, ready for us to step in and go. This new arrangement
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